The governments of German-speaking countries can hardly do without a motto. In 2020, the ÖVP and the Greens voted “Out of Responsibility for Austria”. This sounds less than euphoric and therefore consistent with two parties that are often alien to each other in terms of content and habit. SPD, Verdes and FDP wanted to create a spirit of optimism with “dare more progress”. Borrowing Willy Brandt’s saying “dare more democracy” sounded pompous in the face of the expected challenges in December 2021. Since the escalation of the situation in Russia and the invasion of Ukraine ordered by President Vladimir Putin in February, the first coalition of traffic lights at federal government had to steer Germany through global crises.
In the eyes of citizens, this is not going well. 61 percent rate their work as negative, just 29 percent as positive, according to a Spiegel survey. The longer the war lasts and inflation soars, the more Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) loses popularity. By mid-March, he had received nearly 75 percent approval, according to data from the ZDF’s political barometer. By the end of November, only one in two respondents had a high opinion of him. The SPD, the party with nearly 26% of the vote in the 2021 federal election, is currently fighting for second place with the Greens. The CDU and CSU union is clearly in the lead.
waiting for guns
Conservatives are jointly responsible for the foreign policy and foreign trade disaster that Germany is stuck in as a result of Putin’s war. The ruler in the Kremlin was grossly misunderstood, cheap raw materials from Russia covered up the political dangers. That criticism of Scholz’s 16-year-old predecessor, Angela Merkel, also applies to many social democratic leaders, most notably President Frank-Walter Steinmeier. Handing over weapons to defend against the Russian aggressor ceased to be a taboo for the Scholz government until, contrary to expectations, Ukraine did not have to capitulate within a few hours. Two months after the start of the war, the semaphore opened for the delivery of heavy weapons, such as the Gepard anti-aircraft tank.
With the “Zeitenwende” speech, three days after the start of the war, Scholz took a courageous step. The “peace dividend” after the Cold War had been exhausted in the face of the new threat situation. Even the Swedes and Finns, who have not been aligned for decades, intend to join NATO. The ailing German Bundeswehr is being upgraded with 100 billion euros in “special funds” – with the consent of the Greens with their pacifist tradition. Not Scholz, but Vice-Chancellor Robert Habeck rose to become the face of the “tipping point”. The Green publicly explained his own phases of bewilderment and helplessness and thus touched the public. Scholz did not like this, after all the Germans made him the winner in the elections and “ordered the leadership” from him, which he wanted to hand over.
Special budget trick
The gas tax provided an opportunity to put things in order again in favor of the Hanseatic League. In the summer, Habeck’s department put forward a proposal to support energy importers. As gas prices hit one peak after another, Scholz went from a burden to a consumer relief. As a “double boom”, he sold a limit for gas, electricity and district heating that lasted until April 2024. 200 billion euros will be made available for this. In the EU, the gas price curb is not well received, Italy in particular has criticized a competitive advantage for German companies through lower energy tariffs.
The government has spent a further €97 billion on three aid packages since March, including €9 billion for trains and buses. In this way, citizens should be encouraged to switch to public transport. The gas price brake is financed by borrowing. Like the “special fund” of the Bundeswehr, special budgets are formed, and the basic budget is not overloaded. Finance Minister Christian Lindner can thus announce that the new loan limit will not be exceeded for the first time in three years. The expenditure of 476.3 billion euros is planned for 2023, the new debt is 45.6 billion euros.
This message is central to Lindner. The smallest of the three governing parties often fails to define issues in the coalition. The results of the three state elections in 2022 were similarly bad. In Schleswig-Holstein, the Liberals were the only losers among the three ruling parties, while the CDU and the Greens no longer need the FDP to secure a majority. In Lindner’s homeland of North Rhine-Westphalia, too, the Free Democrats are no longer the ruling party. And in Lower Saxony, it was not even possible to re-enter the state parliament in October.
Simplified Social Reform
Shortly thereafter, Chancellor Scholz had to resort to the harshest means of his governance, the power to set guidelines. The FDP and the Greens were looking for a public contest to carve out their own core brand and found it in the runtime of nuclear power plants. The three reactors will remain online until April next year, Scholz decided. However, there is no such thing as absolute certainty in times of war.
For his core clientele, the chancellor approved raising the minimum wage to twelve euros an hour – a key promise in the 2021 election campaign. In return, Labor Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) clearly accommodates the so-called Union citizen money, which first blocked the bill in the state house.
For the coalition’s second year, many in the red, green and yellow hope the government will fumble less.